Proverbs 13:24. Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.
“Spare the rod and spoil the child,” is the modern day equivalent to this proverb. It is a parent’s responsibility to use loving discipline to guide their child’s heart. To discipline is to love. To spare the rod is to hate.
Parents who truly love their kids will confront and punish them when they purposefully disobey. And parents who hate their kids will ignore or overlook their child’s wrong doing. Why would a parent avoid punishing their children? Because, in comparison, they love something else more than they love their kids (thus the word hate). Maybe they love themselves and their own comfort more. Or maybe they love the approval of their child more than they love their child’s maturity and growth. But the truth is if you want to set your child up for a lifetime of foolishness then simply do nothing.
God’s command to parents to discipline their children is non-negotiable, however, there is all kinds of room for determining the method of discipline. Some have taken the word rod from the proverbs to mean that parents must spank their children. Others have used various “rods” of discipline (time-out, grounding, hot sauce). Although the rod was a literal object used for punishing criminals in Solomon’s day, I think we must also see it as a metaphor for any form of correction used to change a child’s heart from foolishness to wisdom. Disobedient children aren’t criminals; they are wandering sheep. And the rod and staff of God’s comfort (Ps. 23) can keep them on the path of his love.
Loving parental discipline is a common grace, something that God gives to all parents everywhere for the raising of children and the betterment of society, but it is also a special grace for those who are in Christ. Hebrews reminds us of the proverbs’ connecting of fatherly love and discipline:
Hebrews 12:7-8. 7It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.
We know God loves us BECAUSE he disciplines us. And we know God loves us fully because he would take the ultimate punishment, death and hell, upon himself on the cross. Our union with the cross must convince us that the daily discipline of God is not punishment for our individual sins, for that has already occurred in Christ’s cross, but rather, it is the daily sanctifying love of God for us, transforming us into the image of Jesus. Jesus, who also was made perfect through suffering.
Should we expect anything less? Should not our suffering, even our suffering for our sin, be seen as God’s perfecting us as his sons and daughters? Must not our response be to endure, not resist, our Father’s perfect discipline?
You: Can you recognize God’s discipline in your life? Do you endure or resist God’s discipline?
You in Christ: How does your union with the cross of Christ allow you to trust and accept the ongoing discipline of the Lord?
Christ in you: Where can you see the discipline of the Father making you more like the Son?
Pray: Father, I know that your discipline is your love. Help me to see how it is changing me, rearranging the loves of my heart to match my Savior’s. Amen.
To Live is Christ 